Professional Military Education in 2020

The effective employment of air and space power has to do not
so much with airplanes and missiles and engineering as with thinking
and attitude and imagination. - Gen Merrill A. McPeak

The new military needs soldiers who use their brains, can deal
with a diversity of people and cultures, who can tolerate ambiguity,
take initiative, and ask questions, even to the point of questioning
authority. . . . The willingness to ask and think may be more
prevalent in the US armed forces than in many businesses. . .
. As in the civilian economy, fewer people with intelligent technology
can accomplish more than a lot of people with the brute-force
tools of the past. - Alvin Toffler

Professional Military Education (PME) 2020 will become a residency
program unlike any that exists today. It will be a new concept
of professional military education (PME) derived from today's
distance learning, multimedia, virtual reality, and telepresence
concepts. This article describes why the present PME system must
change and what the new system should look like. After we've
discussed the new PME system, we'll examine some of the objections
that have been raised in response to these proposed changes.
However, before we examine the PME system and suggest changes,
we need to highlight potential technologies that can be exploited
for use in PME 2020.

Emerging Technologies

Overall, technology is one of two factors necessary to meet the
capability requirements of PME 2020. In general, current trends
in technology indicate that the technological fields of the future
will be tremendously fertile and highly affordable. For instance,
comparing the 64K random access memory (RAM) computers of the
early 1980s with the top-of-the-line desktop computers of today,
we've seen a 1,000-fold increase in computer memory. The military
can roughly predict that its desktop computers in 2020 will have
about 16,000 times the power of today's computers,1 a conservative
estimate by many industry experts. Some experts predict the computers
of the next century may have billions of times more power because
of coming revolutionary replacements for the transistor. These
new devices will squeeze even more power onto whatever replaces
the computer chip. In other words, industry experts agree that
the military will have plenty of power for whatever it may dream
up. Project 2851, a new standard for digital terrain, is already
facilitating automatic transformation of satellite information
into 3-D virtual landscapes.2 Extensive telecommunications, virtual
reality, and computer simulation for PME 2020 are assured.

But what of the costs associated with this development? Again,
analysis of today's technology cost trends predicts future cost.
Currently the price of computing capability is reported as declining
between 30 and 68 percent per year. ABC Evening News cited a
50 percent reduction in cost every 18 months. Using this conservative
rate, if the military wants to determine what capability it will
be able to buy for each office or classroom for $5,000 ('94 dollars)
in 2020, it should look at the capability that $655,360,0003 could
buy today. Imagine the technology we could purchase in this price
range for each classroom or each individual. Being able to use
current technology in this price range would mean a significant
difference in the office, home, and school. It will give each
student's computer greater simulation capability than the latest
simulators now used by the airlines or military, including surround
picture and close-to-reality simulation. The technologies needed
for PME 2020 will definitely be affordable.

Today's existing technologies also provide some specific examples
and insight of what is possible in 2020. These potential technologies
will solve the information, people, fiscal, and environmental
problems of PME 2020. For example, potential technology exists
today to solve the information overload problems of tomorrow.
Human-computer interaction devices will also aid the war fighter
in this area of information management. In addition, both virtual
reality and worldwide instant access are assured.

Many current military personnel already belong to wide-area networks
such as Internet and bulletin board services such as CompuServe.
These connectivity providers are currently developing the next
generation of network technologies. This includes automated aids
used to find information and people over the networks. These
automated aids are the beginnings of personally tailored automatic
assistants. Edify Corporation has announced its "Information
Agent," which gives users the ability to train computer networks
to automatically gather and analyze data based on user demands.4
Professor Nicholas P. Negroponte, founder of MIT's Media Laboratory,
stated, "We will soon have personalized 'newspapers' coming
over the computer networks, with not only the news, but also the
ads, aimed at the individual."5 Automated assistants with
even greater capabilities will ensure that each individual in
2020 receives the most current and relevant information-tailored
to his or her needs and background.

Many systems are now on-line to assure instant access with other
people and systems around the globe. New Jersey Bell plans on
having all of New Jersey completely fiber-cabled by 2010.6 Other
companies in the US and in most industrialized nations are planning
on doing the same, or in some way providing the same level of
connectivity.7 For those areas, however remote, that will not
be interlinked with cable, space will provide the same functional
connection through satellite links. Commercial enterprises will
send into orbit a constellation of satellites that will enable
instant contact anywhere on the globe, "a cellular system
with very tall towers called satellites."8

All this information will be difficult to assimilate. Virtual
reality itself is being used now as one solution to the information
overload. One method of employing virtual reality as a "database
navigating and mining tool" is used on Wall Street for managing
stock portfolios. It uses a virtual world in which stocks and
groups of stocks are represented by symbols of different color,
shape, position, motion, and other characteristics. This enables
a stock portfolio manager to use the computer to generate patterns
and color changes that summarize at a glance the health and trends
of many more stocks than could be managed as well by flipping
through files or complex computer screens with tables of numbers.9
It is easy to see how this type of application could be used
to summarize much of the data that threatens to overwhelm the
military person.

Another emerging technology comes in the area of enhanced human-computer
interactions. In 1993 these interactions already included full-body
suits for gesture and other motion detection,10 computers embedded
in clothing,11 and experiments in controlling computers by thought.
Regarding the latter, the Alternative Control Technology Laboratory
at Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio, is making significant advances
in mental (hands-off) control of flight simulators. Grant McMillan,
director of the lab, stated:

All control is brain-actuated control, as far as we know. All
we're doing is measuring the output at a different point. . .
. Twenty or thirty years from now, we might be saying, "Gee,
I'd never want a pilot to control the stick with his hands when
he can do it so much better by manipulating his brain activity."12

Manuel De Landa discusses many of the military's developments
in hardware, software, and even "wetware" [the implant
of technology directly into the body] in his book War in the
Age of the Intelligent Machine.13 The military services are
actively developing artificial intelligence and expert systems
to help humans to digest information and act on it. For example,
expert systems have been developed for analyzing radar signatures,
labeling automatically generated maps, analyzing battlefield situations
and air-to-air encounters (from command level down to helping
an outnumbered pilot survive an engagement), planning for contingencies,
diagnosing maintenance problems on aircraft, playing the role
of intelligent opponent in war games, developing attack strategies
for complex targets, helping to detect and counter C3 countermeasures,
providing advice on allocation decisions, assisting launch and
recovery on carriers, and even predicting likely locations and
times of outbreaks of violence.14

By far, however, the most exciting concept on our horizon is
virtual reality. By 2020, virtual reality, or whatever its follow-on
is called, will be ubiquitous. Military personnel will be used
to the technology and to the capability it provides, a capability
that will be a natural part of their lives. Nintendo is already
reaching into the home with first-person virtual reality games.
Already available are virtual reality eyeglasses with built-in
stereo sound systems, similar in appearance to regular sunglasses.15
Also available is software for less than $1500 to build individualized
virtual reality worlds, or one may get a head start by buying
prebuilt worlds for $90 to $400 each. Although these inexpensive
hardware and software systems don't currently match the movie
studio multimillion-dollar systems, "they're sparking creative
breakthroughs . . . and they're helping to drive the development
of an industry, a communication tool, and the ultimate multimedium."16

Joseph Henderson of Dartmouth Medical School, looks at virtual
reality in more practical ways as he describes virtual workplaces
with virtual colleagues whose "physical counterpart may exist
in any of the far-flung problem-solving teams deployed anywhere
in the world." These virtual coworkers will meet and work
in virtual hallways, virtual conference rooms, and virtual laboratories.

One can as easily imagine a virtual high school, technical school,
or university, which provides access to information and expertise
that is anywhere in the world. Even difficult concepts, skills,
and attitudes might be taught using vivid, three-dimensional and
tactile representations of real world objects and issues. This
kind of learning environment could be embedded in the work environment
(even a non-virtual one) much as today's new performance support
systems provide on-line training and reference on the assembly
line. The worker need not leave his or her workplace to be trained;
organizations need not establish and support fixed training facilities
and travel costs can be reduced. Learning done in direct context
with work is likely to be more efficient and effective.17

The military has already laid the foundation for the virtual
reality world of the future. For example, Navy, Marine, and Army
hospitals worldwide already use an interactive video, text, sound,
and graphics system for training medical personnel in preventive
medicine and the treatment of combat trauma in combat zones.18

Virtual realities are a multimedia environment that gives users
the sense of participating in realities different from their ordinary
ones. . . . Such simulations, when done well, should provide
to a user a sense of having a life-experience: learning occurs
at an essential level, a fundamental change in attitudes and behavior
results.19

Virtual reality, or "synthetic environments," was listed
in 1992 as one of the Department of Defense's (DOD) seven main
technology thrusts.20 Victor Reis, DOD director of defense research
and engineering, stated, "The demands of fighting on those
battlefields [of the future], will be radically different from
today's." He also stated that: "synthetic environments
represent a technology to let us learn how to use technology better.
It's that feedback loop that does it." Reis had recently
testified, "Network simulation is a technology that elevates
and strengthens the collective problem-solving abilities of .
. . design teams, manufacturing teams, education teams, training
teams, acquisition teams, or war fighting teams." Finally,
he pointed out that "another benefit" of the synthetic
environments is "cost reduction."21 Thus, by 2020,
for cost and efficiency reasons military personnel will have virtual
reality experience and expectations-expectations that will depreciate
or reduce effectiveness of any military education that fails to
use the learning interface to which the students are used to.

We cannot overemphasize the importance of and the many advantages
of using virtual reality and other interactive technology in
education. First and foremost, interactive technology takes advantage
of the strengths of experiential learning. It also provides
flexibility. Well-constructed, interactive technology lessons
allow for tailoring lessons to the individual, the individual's
learning style, schedule, and the job at hand. It s also timely.
Updated information can easily be dropped into the lesson and,
if using a direct mode of delivery, is instantly available without
waiting to deplete last year's printing. And finally, it s very
student-centered. It can be self-paced and take advantage of
the student's existing knowledge-teaching in the gaps. It can
also provide personalized immediate feedback for everything the
student does or asks.

Why Must the Present PME System Change?

Now that we understand the technological advances which are on
the horizon, it's easier to see why the present PME system must
change. PME must respond to changes surrounding three current
and future issues: the exploding technological and informational
environment we ve discussed, evolving military personnel characteristics,
and continued fiscal constraints.

Challenges of Technological Environment

Obviously, the technological environment surrounding military
members will be very different than the one today.22 Even assuming
no revolutionary breakthroughs, unlikely though that is, and only
the maturation of existing technologies, the technology environment
of 2020 will be a rich one. It will include commonplace use of
artificial intelligence, intense miniaturization, expert systems,
virtual and artificial realities, and automated "computer
assistants." PME 2020 must harness this technology to better
educate the entire military force.

Since the rate of change in technology and the rate of growth
in available information increase every day, all the technological
advances mean that by 2020 information needs will grow exponentially
and the amount of new information will be astronomical. Without
careful planning and information-handling skills, the decision
makers of the future will be susceptible to "analysis paralysis."23
There are estimates that new information will double every few
weeks (or days) due to quantum leaps in technology and the number
of people using it. Instant access to the information super highway,
the Library of Congress, and numerous other sources worldwide
will create an information overload almost unimaginable today.
As the American military increasingly depends on technology
and information to both deter and win war, the military member
must understand technology and information and use them as the
force multipliers upon which the nation has come to depend.

Space, another critical element in any future vision of the US
military, provides many examples of this current and coming information
explosion. One system of satellites alone, set to launch in the
1998-2013 time frame, will generate more than 10 quadrillion bytes
of information about the Earth, "equal to about 10 billion
books (Library of Congress holds a mere 27 million)."24
The "Clementine" mission, now under way, is sending
back 10,000 times the imagery of its predecessor.25 "But
sending data-collecting satellites spaceward is only half the
task. Storing, analyzing, and rapidly disseminating the information
once it is sent back will prove equally difficult."26 "The
helical scan storage technology NASA currently utilizes stores
45 terabytes [equal to 500 million pages of information] on top
of a desk."27 Improvements in sensors make more information
potentially useful but also make searching for it a much greater
task. How will future military analysts quickly determine and
locate the critical information which can mean life or death and
success or failure in the combat environments of 2020? The military
education system must help analysts and operational units by determining
which methods and technologies will be needed. PME 2020 needs
to prepare the future war fighter for these informational and
technological explosions because information itself could be the
next battlefield.

Personnel Attributes

Just as the informational and technological environment will
differ by the year 2020, the characteristics of military members
also will be significantly different than they are today. First,
there will be fewer military personnel of all ranks in 2020.
Accordingly, the impact on the unit of attending PME in residence
will be greater because there will be fewer people to fill in
for anyone going TDY or PCS to school. Second, personnel will
be located at geographically scattered stations in the US and
abroad, locations which may be very different from those today.
Third, there will be fewer personnel of senior rank, officer
and enlisted, at any one location. This means both a higher cost
incurred for those who must leave the unit for education or training
and also less chance of finding enough people of a given rank
to constitute a face-to-face, on-location seminar. PME 2020 must
be able to accommodate this smaller, geographically separated
military force that may not be able to afford the opportunity
to attend lengthy and costly resident PME. "In addition
. . . in 2020, students will be more familiar and comfortable
with technology. For example, they will have grown up with virtual
reality in the home and school. Personnel will also be familiar
with the blurring between work, education, and home life and with
the multiple careers and diverse demands on workers of 2020."28

Fiscal Constraints Increase

A third reason the PME system must change is to respond to future
fiscal constraints. Military budgets, as a percentage of real
gross national product (GNP), will continue to get smaller in
the future. In particular, fiscal constraints will continue to
impact the number of military members who will attend or enroll
in PME.29 Since there will be less money to spend on travel,
we can infer that there will be fewer TDYs and PCSs to attend
PME and other specialized training and less money for many kinds
of equipment and infrastructure. As the military appropriation
tracks downward, costs for technological capability (desktop,
especially) are falling between 30 and 68 percent per year (and
appear to be able to do so indefinitely). Therefore, fiscal constraints
will mean increased use of technology to cover for personnel who
are traveling or whose jobs have been automated or eliminated.
PME 2020 has to be able to better educate more people with fewer
dollars.

What Should PME 2020 Look Like?

If we should have to fight, we should be prepared to do so from
the neck up instead of from the neck down. - Jimmy Doolittle

As a result of responding to these three issues-the technological
explosion, changing personnel requirements, and the increased
fiscal restraints-PME 2020 will need to have an entirely new
look, feel, and responsibility. Let's look at areas of
emphasis for the new PME system, for while the present PME system
may be adequate today, it will not be adequate in the future without
these significant changes.

First, PME 2020 must respond to the information and technology
explosion. One of the first of these responses is that PME
2020 must teach the war fighter how to navigate the information
highways. Information navigation (searching) skills will
be critical for all who expect to navigate the rapidly increasing
sea of information. PME 2020 problem-solving techniques will
emphasize the skills required to narrow the search for critical
information in the aircraft, ship, or tank. The PME system will
have to be much more adaptive, enabling it to respond to this
ever-increasing and changing world of information. PME 2020's
theme is capsulized in the statement "Knowing the knowledge
terrain will be as important for third-wave armies as knowing
the geography and topology of the battlefield was in the past."

In addition, the new PME system must maximize the technological
environment by keeping every military member "connected."
"Virtual residency" is the linking of telecommunications
and computers in PME 2020. All 2020 military personnel will be
"connected" to databases through wide area networks
such as Internet. By the middle of 1993, Internet alone was already
interconnected with over 15,000 other networks and over 20 million
primary users.30 Internet's membership is currently growing more
than 20 percent per month.31 Regardless of unit location, military
personnel will have access to worldwide information networks capable
of two-way data, image, and simulation transmission. "What
telecommunications does is to remarkably expand the quantity and
quality of information resources that can be in a classroom,"
says Linda Roberts, a senior associate in the science, education,
and transportation program at the US Congress's Office of Technology
Assessment. This manifests itself in "the ability to work
with other classrooms, to expand the community of learners, and
to have real access to people who know something. . . ."32

The telecommunications aspect of PME 2020 will also have a positive
impact on the faculty. Edward Mabry, a communication researcher
at the University of Wisconsin, noted that the strength of an
academic department today "depends on the extent to which
each faculty member is interconnected with other professionals-worldwide-pursuing
similar interests."33 Future technology will make for more
of this than is allowed by current technology and fiscally constrained
faculty travel opportunities.

Finally, PME 2020 needs to incorporate the new technology in
order to broaden its horizons by becoming an open system that
educates everyone and provides a curriculum that is continuously
updated and distributed using enhanced distance learning methods
known as virtual residency in PME 2020. Thus PME 2020 should
be an open education and training program, a two-way gathering
and sharing between students and faculty who simultaneously build
an infrastructure on the expectations and experiences from personnel
at all levels. To efficiently use military resources, information
should be shared with other military services and with civilian
institutions, especially in research and curriculum development.
For example, history lessons might be developed by PME academies
or civilian institutions and then shared among institutions.
Current commercial CD-ROMs already include disks on almost every
major war in US history as well as information on the space system
and military aircraft. Military schools and other military organizations
may find that their methodologies, information, and courseware
have commercial value.34

These telecommunications and open system aspects of PME 2020
could then contribute to increased understanding and support for
the military, giving PME 2020 the capability to reach larger audiences
such as the media, Congress, and the public at large. A public
better informed on military capabilities, competence, and needs
will be beneficial for America, improving the chances of continued
public support for the military. As Alvin Toffler observed, "Smart
generals understand all too well that wars can be won on the world's
television screens as well as on the battlefield. . . . Media
policy, therefore, along with policies for communication and education,
will together comprise the main distribution components of any
overall knowledge strategy."35 But responding to all of
these technological issues is just the first step for PME 2020.

Second, in responding to personnel challenges, PME will have
to make several more changes. PME 2020 must tailor its education
to individual needs. It will have to become a self-modifying
educational system that responds to the learning modes (such as
"visual" or "aural") of each student and is
able to adjust its instruction as the data changes from day-to-day.
Faculty are then free to concentrate on instructing at higher
levels of learning and developing courses for entirely new areas
of instruction instead of chasing down items such as name changes
of countries, organizations, or weapon systems. This tailoring
of education to individual needs can be accomplished by using
the same technology in PME 2020 that can be used for on-the-job
training and education (OJTE), technology that transfers specialized
or general OJTE directly to the war fighter by "beaming"
it into aircraft, tanks, or ships.

Additionally, to meet the future personnel challenges, PME must
also take advantage of the increased technological aptitudes of
its people. The pre-adult environment of 2020 military recruits
will have habituated them to technology and to more readily accept
technological changes; however, in 2020, war fighters raised in
this technologically rich environment may or may not have all
the necessary skills to use all this information. The current
college generation is characterized as "victims of declining
educational standards. . . . Three quarters of college professors
say students are 'seriously unprepared' in basic skills."36
PME 2020 must be able to respond to the education and training
needs of these individuals. A system that provides access to
all resources at all levels to all students is the best method
to counter any problems with basic skills.

PME 2020 will be a truly up-to-date curriculum. First, since
courses will be available on demand, military members will be
able to learn skills and find information when needed. Second,
by establishing expiration dates on courses with time-sensitive
material, PME 2020 will ensure that currency is maintained and
that graduates of those courses are cued to their need for refresher
courses or repetition of the original courses.

Another way the system responds to personnel challenges is to
contribute to the recruiting and retention of the best-qualified
personnel. A policy letter from the secretary of the Air Force
cited concern with shrinking forces and budgets and noted that
"the increasing frequency and duration of deployments will
eventually make retention of high quality personnel more difficult."37
The virtual reality, computer simulations, and telecommunications
technology associated with PME 2020 could attract those interested
in state-of-the-art technology.38 Research results indicate the
environment and opportunities of PME 2020 should be conducive
to retaining technologically oriented individuals.39 In addition,
the level of technology represented in PME 2020 and the ability
for personnel to be in contact with virtual seminars and research
groups and to continue instruction even while on deployment to
remote regions could aid retention.

PME 2020 should also take advantage of a changing work environment.
Increasing numbers of challenges such as new warfare forms, combined
with the technical environment, will mean that our people will
have to be "more comprehensively trained, less specialized"
and will have to cycle back through school often during their
careers. They will need a "broader range of skills"
in order to be "more flexible."40 Virtual residency
will provide the means for military members to accomplish those
ends. But part of the building of the PME 2020 system should
include implementing a change in the workday/workweek paradigm
to include scheduling sacrosanct times (similar to the "Minuteman
Education Program") for individuals to attend PME 2020 courses.
Commanders must make the commitment to education and training
to ensure time is set aside. PME 2020 must be as easy to schedule
and attend as a staff meeting, including coordinating times for
"virtual" seminars with members at geographically separated
locations.

PME 2020 must also strive to continually educate and involve
every military member. As Tom Peters states in his book Thriving
on Chaos, we must (1) invest in human capital as much as in
hardware; (2) train entry-level people and then retrain them
as necessary; (3) train everyone in problem-solving techniques
to contribute to quality improvement; (4) train extensively following
promotion to the first managerial job, then train managers every
time they advance; and (5) use training as a vehicle for instilling
a strategic thrust.41 This need to have a better educated and
trained force requires that all military personnel receive their
education and training through a quality PME system. The PME
2020 system will continue the "seminar" experience through
"on-line" seminars and virtual residency. This telecommunication
aspect of PME 2020 will provide PME continuing connectivity to
every military member, allowing individuals to broaden their expertise
and become educated in areas outside of their primary career fields.
Additionally, there is a potential for unique combinations of
backgrounds and interests working within the system on the same
project.

This concept of "continual" education will use the
above connectivity to achieve two other key aspects of PME 2020:
lifelong learning and two-way involvement. Individuals will
no longer have long periods of day-to-day jobs punctuated every
five to ten years with a formal school. Instead, PME 2020 will
offer the richness of continually updated courses of varying length
on almost any subject, including those vital to improving day-to-day
operations. Additionally, the opportunities for research (from
simple questions to complex issues) and contacts with others will
both increase the expertise of and enrich the lives of military
members. Individuals with special skills or interest would not
have to stop their involvement even with retirement. Also, combining
these opportunities with the open-enrollment aspect of most PME
2020 courses greatly increases the chances for cross-pollination
between varied career fields and individual backgrounds. This
would help the future military member to cope with frequent career
and job changes, and, according to Alvin Toffler, it should improve
the strategic vision of future possibilities.42

Finally, a third change for PME 2020 concerns future fiscal
constraints. PME 2020 must thrive within fiscal constraints
by improving results while reducing costs in money and time.
PME 2020's potential accomplishments are limitless; however, dollars
required to educate and train war fighters are finite. Due to
fiscal constraints, there will be fewer high-priced weapon systems
developed and more frequent, incremental, technological upgrades
to existing systems. Often we'll have to rethink systems use
and retrain users-i.e., the war fighters and their support personnel.
For this situation, the virtual reality learning environment
is ideal. The simulate-before-you-build principle explores the
problems, benefits, and trade-offs of training people to use the
new system, educating leaders in employing the systems, and experimenting
with possible countermeasures and limiting factors.43

In addition, PME 2020's use of interactive technologies
for delivery of instruction can reduce costs and improve results.
Some studies demonstrate as much as 50 percent or more reduction
in time needed to learn compared to conventional delivery.44
Digital Equipment Corporation reported saving 40 percent of training
time by using multimedia instead of traditional classroom teaching.
The International Business Machines (IBM) marketing education
division reported time savings of 40 percent.45 Federal Express
saved 60 percent of training time.46

IBM is a prime example of how the interactive technologies might
reduce military costs and provide better results. IBM reported
an overall savings of more than $150 million per year, with much
of the savings coming from 300,000 employees not traveling to
receive their instruction.47 The military could see similar dramatic
savings by eliminating much, if not all, of the physical residency
requirement for courses-and thus eliminate much of the TDY, moving,
dislocation, per diem, and other costs of students attending resident
courses lasting from several days to 10½ months. Virtual
residency has the potential to train more military members, more
effectively, for less.

Virtual residency, with a core curriculum and consolidated resources,
is in fact the most important aspect of PME 2020. It allows PME
2020 to have a core curriculum integrating land, sea, air, space,
nonlethal, and information warfare. And it allows the resources
of PME 2020 institutions to consolidate where practical and to
integrate the newest technological advances within the courses.
Finally, virtual residency is the main means of educational distribution.

Objections

I think the main failure of culture is the failure of imagination.
It's very hard to think outside the boxes- cultural box, institutional
box, political box, religious box-that we are all, everyone of
us, imprisoned in. - Alvin Toffler

As in all new ideas and changes from long-held beliefs and ways
of doing things, there will be hurdles to overcome before we can
successfully implement a new PME 2020 system. The first hurdle
is resistance to change from current training methods to an interactive
technology.

What are the most common reasons given for not using interactive
technology or for resisting its inclusion in educational programs?
According to a study48 by the Business Research Group of Newton,
Massachusetts, the following were the obstacles to implementing
multimedia applications:

Obstacle

Percent

Cost

51

Equipment

19

Lack of expertise

13

Training

11

Lack of industry standards

8

Management resistance

7

Time

6

Inadequate applications

3

No obstacles

9

Other

4

As previously discussed, the equipment will be affordable. As
the equipment becomes more user-friendly, lack of expertise and
training will be less significant. Industry is currently developing
the standards. Therefore, management resistance seems to be the
most significant factor. Promoting the advantages and applications
of this technology is the only way to overcome the mind-set.
For example, a survey of national business leaders and trainers
regarding what methods best improved 41 key business skills revealed
that 32 of the skills were best taught using experiential exercises
and/or simulations. Lecturing was judged best for one skill-listening
reflectively. The remaining eight skills were judged best taught
using case studies (which also could be done very easily in the
virtual seminar environment). The business leaders also rated
the skills in importance. The four top-rated skills-to adapt to
new tasks, to make decisions, to organize, and to assess a situation
quickly-were all considered best taught by simulations.49 But
even with demonstrated strengths of the methodology and technology,
there will still likely be resistance on at least some level.

Del Wood, IBM design specialist, stated that among the Fortune
500 companies in which he has helped implement multimedia,
he has frequently encountered two types of resistance. One type
resulted from intolerance of delayed gratification when the users
must wait for the payback on investment until after development
of lessons and schedules. The other type of resistance was the
result of "a fundamental human aversion to change" caused
by multimedia lessons requiring a different set of skills, orientation,
and commitment.

Mr Wood pointed out that the diverse skills and resources needed
for good interactive courseware require "multiple champions
and visionaries to implement a change."50 This need for
champions is one the military must address. By fostering a continual,
though gradual, conversion of methodologies as the military education
system marches toward 2020, the system will grow the champions
as the interactive system grows.

The move toward this process has already begun in the military.
For example, the Air Force Institute of Technology (AFIT) began
its nationwide distance education course in systems planning and
management last year. Serving over 7,200 students, it should
have a cost benefit of $20 million over six years.51 Also, AFIT
has an ongoing professional continuing education program, making
use of satellite links throughout the Air Force. This type of
distance learning, in addition to being more cost-efficient, will
be more effective in accomplishing joint education and training.
The services are looking more and more at sharing education tasks
and resources to achieve those cost benefits, especially with
distance education.52 In 1992, Maj Gen Larry Day, deputy chief
of staff, for technical training in what was then Air Training
Command, stated,

In the next decade, more and more training will occur away from
traditional training sites. . . . The concept [distance education]
will save on travel and per diem costs and should be a routine
training technique for all the services within a decade. . . .
The effort [to share training across services] is led by a little-known
group called the Interservice Training Review Organization.53

Another concern over PME 2020 is the belief that distance learning
takes away from personal contact, the key value of PME. However,
even without the existence of the virtual reality of 2020, current
connectivity has already demonstrated that interactive communication
through electronic means may lead to even greater openness and
understanding than face-to-face communication. This is due to
the entirely egalitarian nature of the interaction, which eliminates
many of the intimidating and inhibiting factors of face-to-face
communication in the same room. For example, in 1993 one of the
top "head hunter" executive recruiting firms, as a cost-cutting
measure, began providing videoconferencing technology for client
companies to use for interviewing top-level candidates, a situation
where "every nuance of face-to-face communications is crucial."
The vice-president of the recruiting company was surprised at
the results: "Initially we thought they would interview
candidates and then fly in the final candidate, but in many cases
candidates have accepted the job right over the ConferView. They
were more comfortable than we thought they would be."54
Interpersonal skills apparently can be communicated over the
electronic medium. Coincidentally, the above firm estimates it
will save clients $135 million this year in reduced travel costs.

Second, by 2020, virtual reality will provide the stimulus of
co-location. MIT already is working on computers that will read
subtleties of facial expression and voice and duplicate them on
computer-generated representations of individuals involved. MIT
researchers are even teaching the computer to recognize the difference
between a genuine and a fake smile.55

Third, the virtual classroom may be supplemented, at least at
first, by a physical meeting of the participants. This meeting
will likely be of a short-orientation nature. For example, designated
virtual seminar mates, spanning services and nations, may meet
for two weeks of orientation at the beginning (and perhaps annually)
of a three-year virtual seminar course. This physical meeting
should enhance and personalize the computer representations of
each of the seminar members. Even today's virtual reality simulators
already allow participants to quickly dismiss any lingering artificialities.
Bruce Sterling reported on Army tank crews and their virtual
reality experiences:

Group by group, the dead tank crews filed into the classroom and
gazed upon the battlefield from a heavenly perspective. Slouching
in their seats and perching their forage caps on their knees,
they began to talk. They weren't talking about pixels, polygons,
baud-rates, Ethernet lines, or network architectures. If they'd
felt any gosh-wow respect for these high-tech aspects of their
experience, those perceptions had clearly vanished early on.
They were talking exclusively about fields of fire, and fall-back
positions, and radio traffic and indirect artillery strikes.
They weren't discussing "virtual reality" or anything
akin to it. These soldiers were talking war.56

A third concern about distance learning (or for our purposes,
virtual residency) is that it reduces student interaction with
the faculty. In this case, however, the facts argue that
increased connectivity will mean even greater interaction with
faculty, with more efficient use of student and faculty time,
by using on-line multiparty interactive or virtual conversations.
In addition, there will be increased access to experts not on
the "resident" faculty but merely available to answer
questions in their particular area. This is a critical aspect
of PME 2020 when one considers future reductions in the numbers
of military experts and in the funds for hiring full-time civilian
(including retired military) experts. Will PME schools and courses
be able to afford full-time subject matter experts for each particular
weapon system, culture, or strategy? The virtual residency, expert
systems, and telecommunications aspects of PME 2020 guarantee
these experts, or at least their knowledge, will be available
on demand for the future war fighter.

Additionally, students can use virtual reality to talk with Caesar
and Napoléon.57 These "virtual" leaders will
be programmed with all the anecdotes, paintings, photos (if available),
film, video, and books about them. MIT and other labs are working
on programs to create "virtual" people that seem alive
in virtual reality environments. At MIT, the research project
is appropriately named ALIVE.58 Children's games are already
using the beginnings of this technology to introduce students
to historical figures. To reduce artificiality , computer software
makers in Japan are now producing interactive computer programs
in which the characters' lips are in synch with the words they
speak.59

Looking Toward the Future

Victory smiles upon those who anticipate the changes in the character
of war, not upon those who wait to adapt themselves after the
changes occur. - Giulio Douhet

PME must begin changing now to ensure that it maintains capability
and relevance to positively impact the future war fighters and
guarantee their ability to contribute to national security. A
successful PME 2020 system depends upon taking advantage of existing
or emerging technology and operational exploitation opportunities.
The military must now begin planning for PME 2020. First, an
office of primary responsibility (OPR) must be appointed to oversee
and implement the changes. This OPR will also be a liaison between
the PME system and civilian education systems and emphasize usability
and commonalities to both worlds. The military needs to immediately
establish at least a temporary home for a central repository of
military and civilian research and proposed solutions regarding
questions raised in this paper about potential technologies. Air
University (AU) could be that initial repository, and it could
establish an on-line list of people and organizations now researching
PME-related areas. AU could then develop this central repository
and on-line capability with current technology, needing only computers,
large storage devices, and on-line connectivity for incoming and
outgoing information and questions. As the military builds toward
PME 2020, there will be a continual need to know what the most
promising upcoming potential technologies are and how best to
apply them. To avoid being placed in a reactive catch-up mode,
military educational institutions must take steps now to become
proactive-leading the way, instead of being dragged, into the
next century.

Second, working groups must be formed to recommend changes to
the PME infrastructure. The first requirement for initiating infrastructure
changes is continuing to research the educational and technological
environment and to determine which structures will lend themselves
best to rapid adaptability to technology. PME working groups
made up of various career fields, having a variety of skills and
interests can serve as the initial catalyst for the forming of
PME 2020 to recommend what funds are required to purchase technology
and develop points of contact at military and civilian institutions.60

Third, emerging technologies need to be monitored constantly
for developments that might aid PME programs to teach military
members how to effectively and efficiently manage the coming flood
of raw data. Continual connections and computers responding to
thoughts (although limited at this time)61 are only two examples
of emerging, evolutionary technologies that are allowing knowledge-level
information to become largely the responsibility of computers
rather than the responsibility of individuals. Regarding continual
human-computer connection, "nearly every major computer company
is currently developing wearable hardware. . . . The Tender Loving
Care PC for paramedics features a screen embedded in a pair of
high-tech glasses and a hand-held sensor to measure the patient's
vital signs."62 These devices may not have an immediate
application for the PME system, but they nevertheless will have
an impact on it.

Finally, the path to a successful PME 2020 will depend upon the
quality improvement process to generate better ways to perform
the education mission. In fact, some organizations have already
started to shift direction to take advantage of the near-term
technologies and the operational exploitation opportunities they
afford. The Air War College Organizational Plan includes initiatives
for a teleconferencing capability and for an interactive simulation
link between the senior service schools. However, money is still
needed to implement these initiatives. Also, the scope of these
actions needs to be extended. The justification for the interactive,
linked capability applies to personnel other than just the senior
officers, and to subject matter other than just war gaming:

Given the mandated decline of precious resources and personnel,
it is in the best interest of our nation to provide our officers
with every opportunity to practice in peacetime the combat decision-making
they must employ in time of war. As war fighting continues to
become more complex, senior leaders need experience translating
national level decisions into operational action. This exercise
of operational art requires not only development of plans and
campaigns, but more importantly the opportunity to manage and
execute those plans and campaigns. Educational wargaming provides
this vitally important opportunity, and because it is process
oriented, it improves war fighting, combat decision-making methodology.
Compared to costly field training exercises, wargaming can provide
a low-cost and certainly more efficient environment wherein officers
can practice in peacetime the skills they will need in combat.63

Conclusion

Our military forces will be much smaller in 2020, yet the world
will still be a dangerous place. In addition, space joins land,
sea, and air as a conflict medium as competition among nations
in space increases. This environment, coupled with the information
explosion, the changing characteristics of military personnel,
fiscal constraints, and significant technological advances, will
require a much more educated and trained force if America is to
remain a military superpower in the twenty-first century.

To meet this requirement, we will have to change policies and
processes. While technology developments will determine the possible
ways of delivering education, educational policies and processes
will determine (1) who is educated (everyone or a select few),
(2) when military members are educated (at specific times for
all, or at appropriate times throughout each individual s career),
and (3) where military members are educated (in-residence or
through virtual residency).

The primary method of ensuring PME 2020 can meet the above needs
and is relevant to the war fighter is through the efficient and
effective use of leading-edge technology. As Col John A. Warden
III, commandant of the Air Command and Staff College, stated:
"PME must be on the cutting edge of technology if it is
to survive as an institution in the future." Let us not
be like the University of California professor 100 years ago who,
in an issue of Popular Science, retracted his 1888 statement
that self-propelled flying machines were "impossible"
by saying that "while possible, the engineering difficulties
are enormous and possibly insurmountable." Nine years later
he was proven short-sighted at Kitty Hawk.64 If we fail to take
steps now to prepare for what technologies and processes must
be developed for future education and training programs, we too
will be viewed in future years as short-sighted.

28. Writing in Technical Horizons in Education Journal,
("Connecting with the Future Today," April 1994), Lee
Droegemueller, Kansas commissioner of education, gives one view
of the education world of the next century:

Visible transformations in the world of work indicate the future
integration of the workplace, home, and school. Responsibilities,
functions, and activities that once occurred exclusively within
each domain are crossing over into other environments. . . . No
longer can the school, the office, and the home be separate from
one another. These three once-distinct entities are breaking
apart, combining and overlapping in new ways.

The major connector of these three entities-home, school, and
work-is technology. . . . Thus the direction for planning must
be to build the learning community and to focus upon connectivity.
This means that the communication systems, networks or infrastructure
among the community partners, and how they are connected to the
world, become the top priority.

To avoid a similar fate (to businesses which are overwhelmed by
technology), schools must use technology for students to learn.
Technologically connecting the school with the home and work
will make learning relevant and useful. Learning will have no
boundaries, as students can connect with others to access information,
ideas and experiences from within the community, across the state
and around the world (page 10).

34. For example, the multimedia lessons Air Command and Staff
College is integrating into current curriculum may have value
at civilian institutions or on the commercial market as well.
These or other military-created products could be sold or traded
for information or services. As the military develops expertise
in authoring in the virtual reality and simulation areas, there
no doubt will be opportunities to sell actual or modified products
to civilians or to encourage commercial vendors to develop items
the military requires by providing a less risky, guaranteed,
military market.

37. Policy letter from the secretary of the Air Force, September
1993, 4.

38. Currently, the military has already started new recruitment
strategies in over 50 career fields. These strategies are aimed
at recruiting individuals who already possess the basic skills
needed for various specialties. These individuals require little
if any training in the basics of their career field. The attractiveness
of PME 2020 technologies will enhance this strategy. PME 2020
will not only help recruit these targeted individuals; these same
technologies will help retain them.

39. In a survey referenced in CIO magazine, the importance
of various factors in attracting and retaining technology-related
professionals was rated by those professionals. The opportunity
to work with leading-edge equipment was rated as very important
by 64 percent of those surveyed, opportunity to work on important
projects-62 percent, enthusiasm for the mission of the business-57
percent, and opportunities for promotion into management received
only 36 percent.

46. Caterpillar used interactive media for language training
and saw 50-60 percent savings, and expects to save up to $20 million
in US operations alone. Bethlehem Steel uses over 100 interactive
courses, including more than 15 as part of their Total Quality
Management (TQM) program, and reports 20-40 percent time savings,
higher retention, and increased participation in voluntary programs.
Ford Motor Credit Company estimates cost savings of 25 percent.
Bell South reports one program saved $5 million and 20,000 days
of instruction. They also have condensed a five-day conventional
course into a seven-hour interactive course. They report an 80
percent time savings with 40 percent higher retention levels.
Ibid., 56.

57. A recent CNN news tidbit featured a computer-generated Mark
Twain for rent. This Mark Twain responds to almost any question
with a witty response that takes into account all of Twain s writings
and biographical notes from people who knew him. He s currently
being used primarily for promotional events at shopping malls,
but he definitely shows the potential for PME 2020 to introduce
historical figures and experts in the classroom.

59. "Make Sense of Japanese with Your Own Sensei,"
Windows, May 1994, 90.

60. The working groups will formulate positions on numerous
education related subjects. Questions such as (1) What are the
true benefits of resident programs versus nonresident ones? (2)
When will virtual residency be advanced enough to replace resident
programs? and (3) What taxonomy, if any, should replace Bloom's
will need to be answered when the military begins to incorporate
emerging technologies into the PME system?

The conclusions and opinions expressed in this document
are those of the author cultivated in the freedom of expression,
academic environment of Air University. They do not reflect the
official position of the US Government, Department of Defense,
the United States Air Force or the Air University.